Hehe, sorry guys, I got writer's block and didn't write for… what was it? 3 Weeks? Writer's block, school (HHUUGGEE S.S. project), and lots of complicated things with my personal life (which I do have, by the way). You can blame the VERY late chapter on those. I had no real plan for this chapter, so it's not that good. And at this point in the story Yuna and co have just left Bevelle and Seymour returned to Guadosalam as an unsent. Remember that Tidus and Rikki get to skip a lot of stuff 'cause they don't need to go to the temples and there's only two of them, so they're journey is a lot quicker. (My brother just screamed "Mr. Fuzzbucket, WHY?"… O_o…freak…)

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Let's just say we were lucky the guado were really slow (A/N I know they're actually really fast XD) I mean, me and Rikki are pretty agile, but it wasn't like we could outrun a whole society.

Unless, that is, they're the guado. We didn't even have to sprint. If it weren't for the screaming guys behind us, I would have thought we were running for pleasure.

Except I'm not that stupid.

But, seriously, we got to the Thunder Plains with basically no trouble. The cowards didn't pursue us once we got there.

A large streak of lightning flashed through the sky. Rikki stared at it in amazed horror. "What was that?" She gasped. I chuckled.

"Never seen lightning before?" I teased. She shook her head. Her eyes were about the size of a small dinner plate.

"I never went outside until they" -She shuddered when she said "they"- "got rid of me." I stared at her. She'd never seen lightning? Or thunder? Not even rain?

Obviously not. She was staring at the sky and inspecting her arms where large raindrops were running down them.

While she was exploring the wonderful world of nature, lighting struck about seven feet from us, shaking the ground and making both of us jump about a foot in the air. "Let's just get out of here." I grabbed Rikki's arm and dragged her toward the nearest lightning tower.

"T-Tidus, I don't think I like lightning…" She whispered, clinging to my arm.

"Then let's just get through this place." I wasn't exactly fond of the place myself.

"H-how much farther?" She whimpered after we took about two steps. I sighed. This was likely to get really annoying really fast.

"A lot." I replied. "It would go a lot quicker if you let go of me and walked yourself." When she didn't move, I tried to pry her fingers off of my arm but the more I tried the harder she held on. I winced as her nails dug through my shirt. "Please." I practically begged. She shook her head frantically and started pulling me down the path.

Oh, boy. Walking. My favorite.

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The halfway point was the best thing I had ever seen in my life. My arm was sore, my legs were tired, I had a headache from Rikki's whining, and I was soaked and freezing. Basically, I was having the time of my life (note the sarcasm, people).

Rikki dashed into the travel agency as fast as she could possibly go. Which, by the way, is pretty fast. I followed her a little more slowly.

Needless to say, we didn't continue for a while. To spare you the details, it was difficult to get Rikki out again.

The storm was a hundred times worse at that point.

This experience confirmed what I'd been pondering for a while:

Nature sucks. Especially when you have an ADHD fifteen-year-old not-so-dumb blonde clutching your arm. Especially if she decides she hates thunder and lightning. And especially you're in the middle of a storm that never stops for anything.

So, for me, nature sucks pretty bad.

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Well, it was kinda short, but it was something. And I PROMISE PROMISE PROMISE I'll post another chapter before next Saturday. I PROMISE. I AM STILL ALIVE!!!!!! YAY!!!!! Anyway, I wanted to make Rikki a lot like Rikku, so I gave her the deathly fear of thunder storms. I couldn't just have her already hate them because Rikku didn't like them because of a childhood accident. Honestly, if you were fifteen and you'd never seen a giant bolt of electricity fall out of the sky, wouldn't you be a little freaked out? And the whole "nature sucks" thing is major irony for me XD I'm a nature freak. I love nature. But, considering their situation, I would probably think nature sucked pretty bad at that point, too.